"Spicknspan" wrote in message
...

95% of the time there are far too many taxis. Unfortunately,
the decision as to the numbers appears to be based on the
demand for cabs during those peak
times, such as a rainy Saturday night.

As a cab driver myself, I've often wondered if there'd be
a benefit to permitting knowledge boys in the latter stages
of the knowledge to work Friday and Saturday nights in the
West End only. I've been out for 3 years now, and I know
I could have done the job 6 months before I got my badge.

I would have thought many of the runs from Central London on Friday and
Saturday nights would go way out into the suburbs, and since All-London
knowledge students don't do that until the last few months of their
training, this is the time of the week when they are least fit to do the
job. Also, where are the knowledge students going to get taxis from? If they
only work 8 hours a week, they won't be able to afford to hire a taxi.

A better idea would be to allow qualified suburban yellow-badge taxis to
pick up at the directional rank at Cranbourn St, since they are better
qualified to take people to the suburbs than the All-London green-badges,
and it's stupid to have them driving an empty taxi back to their suburb at
the time of peak demand. They should be charged a sizeable fee to pick up
here, otherwise it might be in their interest to repeatedly work the
Cranbourn St rank, driving back to it empty. This would probably require the
directional rank marshalls to split destinations by the 9 yellow badge
sectors instead of NE - NW - SE - SW as now.

--
John Rowland - Spamtrapped
Transport Plans for the London Area, updated 2001
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acro...69/tpftla.html
A man's vehicle is a symbol of his manhood.
That's why my vehicle's the Piccadilly Line -
It's the size of a county and it comes every two and a half minutes